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At first glance, Allison Manch's work looks quaint, maybe a little fussy. Her delicate, hand-embroidered handkerchiefs recall a prettier era, before someone thought to invent Kleenex; back when no gentleman or lady left home without a clean, pressed ...

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Biltmore Fashion Park used to be so full of itself. Once, about 10 years ago, I went there to buy a wedding band, and no one would wait on me. I visited each of the mall's jewelry shops, as well as the jewelry counters in two department stores, and n...

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When asked what new titles are worth buying right now, employees of big chain video game stores can barely muster a sales pitch.
"You like sports games? There's another Madden out. And Mercenaries 2 just launched. It's a . . . first-person shooter...

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In the 25 years or so I've been playing games, never once have I encountered an earnest conversation about what a game means. You see every other sort of discussion -- people talking about how a game looks, or how it plays, how long or short or diffi...

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Something hilarious happens within the first few minutes of Chyro Arts' Dearly Departed: A woman, played by Jacqueline Gaston, reads a wickedly amusing letter to her husband, who suddenly falls over in a dead heap just after she finishes. It's a mome...

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For the downright dazzling opening ceremony of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, world-famous film director Zhang Yimou utilized the form of a basic painting scroll as the quintessential backdrop for his techno-savvy take on 5,000 years of Chinese cultural ...

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The term is "shovel-ware," a gaming phrase used to describe the heaps of worthless, quickly cranked out titles currently choking the Nintendo Wii.
Even EA Games, a major developer, sinks to the Wii's level with the recently announced "Celebrity Sp...

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For months, I thought it was a Chinese restaurant. Good, I'd think as I drove each morning past the grand, pagoda-like monster being erected at 29th Avenue and Northern. The spring rolls at Golden Dragon suck.
Then the crosses went up.
Oh, I th...

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Trinidad Escalante was a mojada. A wetback. Un illegal.
Actually, I can't prove that. But I can say with total confidence that the woman was Mexican. She was born in Hermosillo, Sonora, and eventually crossed the border. Legally or not? Quien sabe...

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You hear the same words used over and over to describe Soul Calibur IV, words like "forced." "Jarring." "Anachronistic." But to me, the word that describes shoehorning Darth Vader and Yoda into a game about sentient swords, Renaissance-era combat, an...

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Walk into an art gallery on a First Friday and you'll see people with drinks in their hands, chatting and laughing -- not noticing they just knocked a painting with their elbow. But the crowds at a contemporary art show at, say, the Museum of Modern ...

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Neal Green remembers when downtown Phoenix spilled into neighborhoods filled with hundred-year-old adobe houses surrounded by acres of land. He remembers groves of towering trees and the thrill of nighttime drives through the Papago Mountains and see...

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Imagine, if you will, a pasty, bespectacled string bean draped in an American flag, an Olympic medal tugging at his pencil neck, all backed by John Williams' orchestral swells and the impassioned cheers of thousands. Yes, friends, this is the moment:...

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It's that time of the year again, when playhouses are mostly dark and pretend awards take the place of real entertainment. This, the fifth Robbie Awards, is a black-tie event, so strap on your imaginary evening wear and take your make-believe seat. A...

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Gandhi is threatening to invade my country if I don't share the secrets of gunpowder with him. Consulting with my advisers, I'm told his army is no threat, its technology far behind mine. I don't believe the numbskulls whispering in my ear: The India...

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On a recent monsoon-ravaged July evening, people were showing the love on Marshall Way in Scottsdale. The Thursday night art-walk crowd was sporting white buttons with phrases like "your thumb print on my skin," "I could jump into you . . . and land ...

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For gamers, E3 -- the Electronics Entertainment Expo -- is Christmas in July, only you don't have to endure the Family Dinner from Hell while your new toys gather dust under the tree.
Translation: It's geek Nirvana.
The annual industry gatherin...

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Considering all the public whimpering and hair-tearing I've done about the routine razing of really great old buildings, I have to hand a palm to the folks at the Children's Museum of Phoenix, which has made its new home in downtown's historic Monroe...

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Perhaps we should all just admit it. There are only three times we pay attention to the Town of Guadalupe. The first is when we use Avenida del Yaqui as a shortcut to get away from I-10's numbing rush-hour traffic. The second is when we want to buy c...